A New Group
by The Cold Soldier
Summary: A new group of Feur, Tech, Morph, Hulk, and Splinter are on the run from the whitecoats as well. However, they call the whitecoats White Knights. When they try to infiltrate the White Knights' school, they meet up with Max and the flock. What happens?
1. Prologue

**Sorry I forgot to put a disclaimer or anything before. Anyway, I don't own the Maximum Ride Characters, but I **_**do **_**own everyone else. Hope you like it. Thanks, SkeletonX, for your review. Always love to be praised. If you wrote anything you wish for me to review, just post so. Review a lot, guys!**

**Prologue- "Which Came First- the Baby or the Bat DNA?"**

My name is Feur Johnson, although I've dropped my last name. After all, who knows if that is even my real last name? The only thing I know is that the people at the hospital wrote Feur Johnson on my birth certificate. The only problem being this: I have no way of knowing if that, like many other aspects of my life, is real or fake. You see, long story short, I, unlike any _normal _person living a _normal_ life, have the abilities of a bat. And no, I'm not like batman or any of that, I'm just Feur, who used to be a normal baby.

At least, before bat DNA was grafted into my own to form some super-hybrid mutant freak. Now, you out there may be thinking, "How cool would it be to have wings and all that?" Well, you want an answer? Here it is: it _sucks._ It can't be any plainer than that. Granted, it isn't all _that_ bad. After all, the feeling of the wind rushing past you as you fly at speeds exceeding one hundred fifty miles per hour is like nothing any normal person can ever imagine. I love it, and yet I hate it.

Why? Because I have every single mutant freak you can imagine (and even more!) hunting me down. You see, the people who created me, who call themselves "The White Knights," (what kind of a name is _that?_) want me "terminated." In other words, they want to kill me. So they send all the other _things_, which is the only way to describe them, after me. Every demonic thing ever created, from a rabbit-man who can bite straight through a three-inch thick solid steel bar with one bite, to a flying _shark!_ I mean, cut me a break!

But, I've survived fairly easily in the past. It's been fifteen years now, and I've done just fine. Plus, not all the mutants the White Knights created are on their side. Take me, for example. I never wanted to be like this, so, the second I was strong enough to lift myself off the ground with my amazingly powerful wings, I was outta there the first chance I got. Up and away, straight into the vast, blue sky. It was amazing. I mean, sure, people were shooting bullets and nets and stuff at me, and this was my second time to fly, but I was still amazed at how high I was flying.

Anyway, back to the point, others like me have escaped. I mean, not _like _me; I'm the only bat-human hybrid that was ever created. But I mean there are other mutated things that have escaped. And they have joined up with me. There are five of us total. Me, Spinter, Tech, Morph, and Hulk (I know, probably thinking I'm cheating out on Marvel Comics, but, nah, he's just huge.) As you read and follow on my—our—journey, you will become more familiar with us. But now, I haven't got any time for explanations. Congratulations on getting this far and not thinking this is a load of crap. It isn't, trust me. I wish it were.


	2. Chapter 1

**DISCLAIMER- I DON'T OWN MAXIMUM RIDE, YADA YADA YADA. YOU UNDERSTAND. ENJOY! AND I PROMISE MAX AND THE FLOCK WILL ARRIVE IN CHAPTER 2. JUST BE PATIENT. AS ALWAYS, REVIEW LOTS! I LOVE TO SEE THE REVIEWS.**

**Chapter One- 'Bat'ter Up!**

_CRACK!_ The solid, powerful connection from the bat to the ball echoed throughout the baseball field, sending my heart leaping. The ball rose higher, and higher still, flying on into the air as though driven by some powerful invisible force. Morph, who was sitting beside me, said, "Cover me!" Instantly I, Hulk, Splinter, and Tech made a human wall around Morph. His human form turned a strange gray color, and then, right before our eyes, he liquefied, shrunk, and solidified as a large, robust bald eagle!

He power housed his way through the air towards the baseball, flying at his quickest speed he could. As he came up to the ball, he wrapped his talons around it, turning around to fly back towards the diamond. However, as he began flying back, a net, fired at over a hundred miles per hour, hit Morph's eagle form, probably breaking every bone in the eagle's body. Morph's wings folded inward, and he began to fall, a crumpled heap of feathers.

"Guys!" I yelled. Everyone knew what to do. If a member of the group was in danger, we forgot all about laying low and taking cover and instead rained down maliciously on the assailant.

Tech, who was a machine-human hybrid, instantly transformed into his robot form, which had been made specifically for military use. A mounted turret raised out of his left arm. Splinter, who had had wood fibers grafted into his bones and flesh, could now create large stakes and spears of wood from any part of his body and shoot them at his enemy. The coat he was wearing was instantaneously shredded, his entire upper body becoming a wooden shield. As for Hulk, well, basically he just ripped off all his blankets and shirts and all that, which he claimed just slowed down his fighting, but I think he likes to show off his muscles.

As for me, I had cut slits into my shirt and parka, which I immediately launched my wings out of. Oh, the feeling! It was _so_ good to stretch them out. My wings, which were each about four feet long, were extremely powerful as well as agile. Although I didn't have Hulk's strength, I did have speed no one else in my group had. And _that,_ combined with my karate skills I had learned--and then taught to the whole group--made me a deadly fighting machine. Plus, I always have the advantage in the dark. Can you say "echolocation?"

Of course, there were thousands of screams and gasps and such, but we drowned them out. Or at least _I _did. One other surprise for the White Knights, their grafting bat DNA into me had also given me unimaginable _running _speed as well. I ran down to the end of the bleachers and, right before I was on the edge, vaulted off with all the force my legs could muster. I spread my great, beautiful wings out, snapping them out and down in one fluid motion. Numerous more nets, along with real bullets, were fired at _me_; however, they didn't count on one thing: I was faster than their aim.

I banked my right wing sharply downward, diving towards one of the attackers. This time, surprisingly, they'd sent _humans_ to take us. I mean, seriously, do _you _think you could take us on? I didn't think so. Anyway, I dove straight towards him, reaching over ninety miles per hour before I collided solidly with him, probably snapping his back. Actually, _definitely _snapping his back. Imagine having a hundred pounds hit you in the torso flying at ninety plus miles per hour. I think you would definitely be dead.

I fired off a burst of echolocation behind me as I did a back flip in mid-air, launching myself straight up as I pointed directly up. As the waves bounced back to me, I saw many, _many _bullets traveling my direction. The largest, most likely to hit me pattern was directly above me. Therefore, I did a lightning-quick flip, shooting down at awesome speeds of over a hundred ninety miles per hour. As I flew by him, I stuck my arm straight out at my side, stiffening it just as it struck an assailant's neck, knocking him straight into the bleachers, his neck broken. Granted, it wasn't that pleasant of a feeling for me either, but the pain was not real. It was merely a message sent by nerves to the brain, messages I could block out. I would have one painful experience later, when the adrenaline wasn't pumping, but that was another time.

As for right now, I continuously sent off bursts of echolocation in all directions, calling locations of hidden attackers out to the group. How did I know where they were? I knew simply by following the trail of the bullet backwards. I saw a chunk of wood fly through the air at over eighty or ninety miles per hour, impaling an assailant I had discovered straight through the heart. Meanwhile, I banked a hard right to dodge a net, and flew straight towards Morph. Suddenly, a man ran straight in front of me and his skin morphed into extremely hard stone. It was suddenly as if time had gone into slow motion.

The man smirked, knowing I would hit him and die on impact. I knew that what I did right then and there decided my fate. I angled my flexible wings slightly downward, then, with all the force I could muster, slammed them down so hard that dust and grass flew all through the air. I flew upwards, so close to the man that my chest brushed his rock-hard one. He snarled loudly in rage and surprise, and then grabbed my right leg. I knew then that I was helpless, as none of my bat skills were honed for fighting a living rock. I expected that hand to squeeze and squeeze like a vice until my leg snapped.

Suddenly, an amazingly loud battle cry exploded in the air as my leg was suddenly released. I quickly gained altitude, until I was about a hundred feet up. I then looked down to see Hulk beating relentlessly on the rock-man beast. Pieces of him were crumbling slowly. I believe it was at that point that he realized that he was in my position. If he morphed back to human, he would die with one hit. If he stayed rock, he would eventually shatter to pieces. He suddenly swung one of his bowling-ball sized fists at Hulk's head. Hulk collapsed to the ground with the impact.

Tech suddenly saw what was going on. He turned and pointed the turret at Rock-Man, clenching his fist. A massive salvo of bullets struck the beast, the .30 caliber one hundred sixty grain Accu-Bonds tearing the Rock-Man up. While the rest of the group had Rock-Man occupied, I swooped down and grabbed the net that Morph was in, flying straight up into the air. I stopped at a couple hundred feet, looking at Morph's limp eagle form. His head rolled over to look up at me. "Morph, come on man," I said. "Morph back to human!" You see, now he could no longer be a bald eagle until his bald eagle morph healed, but if he morphed back to human, he would be fine, because his human form was not the one injured.

The bird looked up at me blankly, not registering me. Then, suddenly, he morphed back into human form, groaning in pain. I nearly dropped him when he morphed back, not expecting the weight. I quickly decided to drop him. He screamed in shock at the freefalling that he was suddenly doing. I pointed downward and just quit flapping entirely. I folded my wings against my side and dropped straight down. I knew for sure that I could get Morph before he hit the ground.

I opened my wings, about nine feet from tip to tip (because of my actual body adding another foot) and began pounding my wings upwards, shooting downward at excess of two hundred miles per hour. At the sight of Morph, I swooped underneath him, flapping down as hard as I could, every muscle straining. I quickly slowed down to about twenty miles per hour. I wrapped my arms around Morph and dropped the last twenty or so feet, using my wings like a parachute. It slowed us down enough. I let Morph get down onto the ground.

I saw that Rock-Man had Splinter over his head and quickly dove down towards him. He was about to throw Splinter when I spun my foot around in a mid-air roundhouse kick, knowing that this could break my foot. I smashed my boot directly into the solid stone face, sending the Rock-Man falling from the shock. I roared in pain from my foot, but was relieved to find that it wasn't broken.

Splinter fell to the ground and scrambled away quickly. I knew we had no chance against this guy. Even Hulk had difficulty keeping him down. That was when Tech revealed his new secret weapon. His shoulder split open, a small, cannon-looking thing coming out of it. He pointed the cannon at the Rock-Man, pressing down on his arm. From out of the cannon, a red-tipped rocket soared towards the Rock-Man. Before he knew what hit him, the Rock-Man was in pieces.

The fight over, we all looked around us. The baseball field was deserted. With my super-keen hearing, I could hear sirens extremely far away but coming quick. "Guys," I said, "we gotta break."

"Yeah," Tech said. "But how are we gonna get away? We can't all fly you know."

"Oh, crap," I said. I hadn't thought of that. After all, I _was _fighting a human rock. "Ok," I said, "everyone can be inspected and considered perfectly normal except Hulk and me. So—"

"No way!" Tech, Morph, and Splinter cried out at the same time. "We can't split up the group! We're like family."

"No we aren't," I said. "We _are _a family. If we weren't, we would have left Morph to be experimented on for as long as he could survive. But we can meet up in the woods outside of the mountains a couple miles from here. And you guys don't have to stay here, you can run. But me and Hulk have to go quickly. So if anyone objects, hurry up and say so." No one said anything.

"Ok guys. Be safe. And _don't get caught. _You know I love you all like brothers." I grabbed Hulk's arm. "Let's go. I'll fly above and you run as fast as you can on the ground. Keep in the bushes. See you guys in a bit." With that I slammed my wings down, launching into the air. Hulk began running swiftly along the ground beneath me, although, if I wanted to, I could have already been to the mountains. If I haven't already mentioned, Hulk is only eight, so you have to think that an eight year old alone and scared is bad enough, but when you throw in the ability to pick up a Volkswagen, then you have a _big _problem.

I stayed very high up, deep in the clouds, using my echolocation to locate Hulk every once in a while. Within twenty minutes we were at our meeting point. With no humans around here, I swooped down and landed, Hulk running up beside me, panting loudly. "That's a…" he gasped. "That's a long run!"

I laughed loudly, patting Hulk on the back. "I'm proud of you though. You did great. You didn't panic in the fight or anything. You were ama—" I stopped in mid-sentence as we went to the base of the mountain where the rest of the group was supposed to meet us. No one was there. The area was torn apart, making it obvious there'd been a struggle. But where was the group?


	3. Chapter 2

**AUTHOR'S NOTE- PLEASE START REVIEWING MORE! I ONLY HAVE ONE REVIEW SO FAR! SKELETONX, IF YOU ARE STILL READING MY STORY, THANK YOU FOR REVIEWING! I'LL POST THE THIRD CHAPTER IN A COUPLE DAYS OR SO.**

**DISCLAIMER- I DON'T OWN MAXIMUM RIDE OR ANYTHING LIKE THAT. I WISH I DID, THOUGH. GREAT BOOKS.**

**Chapter Two- "My Name is Maximum Ride."**

Ok, so I admit I panicked, which was _totally _against my normal attitude. But, hey, would you panic if your family was suddenly kidnapped and vanished? Tears began to roll down Hulk's cheeks. "Where are they?" he sniffled.

"I don't know, Hulk." Another thing that wasn't my style. I normally was always aware of the answers to everything. It's a shaky feeling, not having any clue what's going on. Just then, a commotion in the trees snapped me back into reality as though someone had thrown ice-cold water on my face. If fired a burst of echolocation into the trees to see a squirrel jumping down from the trees. The squirrel landed on the grass.

The squirrel suddenly liquefied and morphed into a human. Morph stood in front of me. "Morph!" Hulk and I shouted simultaneously. His human form had cuts and bruises all over it, but other than that he appeared fine. Hulk and I both ran up and hugged him. I think I heard a couple bones pop when Hulk squeezed.

"What happened here?" I blurted. Morph turned to face me.

"They somehow followed us. I don't know how. I think one of us had a tracking device on. But, anyway, they sent like a thousand different things after us. The worst one was a mixture of a bear, a wolf, and a human. They wound up grabbing the others, but I transformed into an ant and ran like crazy. I climbed up into the trees, transformed into a squirrel, and waited. After a while of searching for me they said they gave up and left. I planted one of Tech's ingenious tracking devices on Splinter. So we know where they are." Morph pulled out a small, electronic map.

A small blip was flashing on the screen. "Ok, guys. Here's my plan. Give me the map thing and I'll go find the van they're in. then, when I find it, I'll listen in and find out where they're going. Then I'll come back to you. Just go up into our cave in the mountains and stay there. If I'm not back by tonight, then stay until tomorrow evening, and then you will know that I'm not coming back." With that, I began pumping my legs, and then, at the edge of the trees, crouched down and vaulted powerfully up into the air, slamming my wings down and gaining altitude quickly.

Since I didn't have any extra people to look over, I flew up to over twenty-thousand feet, simply following the map. I pumped my wings with my maximum strength, soaring at about a hundred and twenty miles per hour. Every muscle in my body strained. Within an hour, I had caught up with the van. I dropped down and lightly landed on top of it.

Thanks to being part bat, I also could hear _extremely _well. I had to hear great to hear my echolocation. I concentrated hard on the dialogue going on inside. "Well," one man with a strong Scottish accent said, "I've been waitin' fer days to get these freaks and get 'em back to in Mobile, Alabama. We finally got 'em, but we didn't get the one we were lookin' fer." Bingo.

I sprang into the air and back flipped, spinning around and snapping out my wings. I pounded my wings down hard, flying through the air at high speed. By evening, I had made it back to the cave.

"I'm back," I said. "And we're heading for Mobile." They both stood up and stretched.

"How do we get there?" Morph asked.

"I know we don't like to break the law, but we're gonna have to steal a car. And a fast one, too. So, Morph, I'm hoping that you can take the roll of a car salesman and get into a Chevrolet dealership. So… I won't force you."

"I'll do it. I don't care if one car is taken to get my family back. The car can be replaced, but they can't." With that, Morph stood up, a grave look on his face, and ran to the edge of the cliff, transforming into a peregrine falcon as he jumped off. He flapped his wings hard and was off. "Come on," I said to Hulk, "let's get some sleep. It might be a while until he gets back.

Some time later, I awoke to Morph standing in front of me saying, "Let's go."

"Tell me you got something that Hulk can fit in."

"Yea and it's pretty quick too." I stood up and stretched, and then shook Hulk until he finally rolled over with a groan. The hard rocks had left my back aching, and it obviously hadn't done much more for him, either. As we walked down the rocky face, I looked into the bushes to see a Chevy truck parked there, a big diesel truck that obviously had a lot of power in it.

"I made up a place in the bed for Hulk. It even has a blanket that I think he will like and I think will hide him well. And, good news, we got GPS navigation. And, since we already know the White Knights are running through Itex, all we have to do is type in Itex in Mobile, Alabama."

"Great job, Morph," I said. I walked up to him and hugged him. "I'm proud of you, man. I'm gonna fly above for a little bit, stretch out for a while." We all had cell phones that were pre-paid and untraceable, and I told Morph to keep it on. "I'll call you and tell you when I want in the truck." He got in and started up the truck, while Hulk snuggled up under the blankets and stuff.

I jumped into the air, pounding my wings. To begin with, I was stiff, my muscle tight and weak. Then, as I stretched out some, I began flying better, and quicker. We were in the "boons" now, as you would call it, and there were no cops around. So, Morph was driving at over a hundred miles per hour, anxious to get to Itex. I flew at the same pace, basking in the sun's warm rays. I loved the feeling. Fortunately, we were in Cullman, Alabama, now, so we wouldn't have to drive for too long.

After a couple hours, I decided that I wouldn't even go into the truck. We should never stop, just keep on going. Lost in thought, I didn't realize what I was doing until it was too late. Suddenly, I flew straight into a huge flock of ducks, all of them quacking extremely loudly as they plowed into me, feathers flying everywhere. I was blinded by shock and feathers. I couldn't use echolocation to find a way out due to the quacking, so I pumped my wings, shooting through the hoard of ducks at over one hundred twenty miles per hour. I might've hurt them, but it wasn't my problem.

I then decided to fly down into the bed of the truck. I swooped down and landed in the bed of the truck, careful not to step on Hulk. I reached my arms to the side and opened up the passenger door, sliding in beside Morph. "How far away are we?" I asked.

"About five minutes away," he said which surprised me. We'd only been driving for about two and a half hours. "Good. Are you ready?" I asked.

"As ready as ever," he said. When we arrived, I woke up Hulk and splashed cold water on his face, quickly getting him ready to fight. I ripped my shirt off to get me as ready as possible, and Morph morphed into a White Knight. He went in first, and then, seconds later, we busted in there (really Hulk did the busting.)

I snapped out my wings, surprised that there was already a fight going on. And Morph hadn't caused it. Five bird kids were attacking every White Knight that moved! Well, I was fine with that! I snapped my wings down and flipped around, shooting for the closest guy. I spun my right leg at an amazing speed, smashing my heel into the man's throat, crushing his larynx. He fell to the ground, choking and spluttering.

I grabbed one of the White Knights and snarled, "Where are my friends?"

"They're down that hallway in the door to the right, first one," he sputtered, sweat pouring off his face.

"You better hope so," I growled, my blood boiling. I ran down the hall, dragging him with me. One of the White Knights attempted to stop me. I smashed my fist into his nose, splintering pieces of his nose straight into his brain. His eyes rolled into his head and he collapsed. I began pounding against the door the man indicated. I couldn't open it. "Hulk!" I shouted.

He ran to my side, swinging a fist at the door. He slammed it straight off its hinges. "Feur!" Splinter and Tech shouted. Hulk ran over to the cage they were trapped in, ripping the bars off the cage with a grunt. A small, scared-looking girl was in the cage next to them. _Get me out of here, _a thought penetrated my mind. Then, not out of my own mind, I said, "Get the girl out of there, Hulk." Hulk obeyed without any arguments. The girl ran out, and I grabbed her and shot into the air.

"LET"S GET OUTTA HERE!" I yelled. However, as I exited the hall, a ferocious-looking bird girl, one of the ones that had been fighting earlier, smashed into me, knocking me off balance.

"You aren't getting my baby!" she shouted at me, spinning a boot at my face. Using my lightning-swift reflexes, I shot to the left, then, in the blink of an eye, went behind her, thrusting a powerful kick into her spine, right between where her wings were.

"What are you talking about?!" I roared as she fell a few feet.

"Give me back Angel!"

"Who?"

"The girl you have. Give her to me, _now." _

"Meet me at the mountains near Cullman. That way I can trust that you aren't trying to hurt her and put her back in a cage."

Before the girl could protest, I shot away into the outdoors, the others jumping into the truck and flooring it outta there! _It worked!_ I thought as I flew at my quickest speed for Cullman. When we got back to the mountains, I sat down and waited for the bird-kids to get there. A few minutes later, they arrives, they're huge wings making them look like archangels in the receding light.

"Who are you?" I asked the girl as she landed.

"My name is Maximum Ride. And this is my family. And the girl you have is a part of it. Now who are you?" she asked.

"I'm Feur, and this is _my _family," I replied. "What were you doing at the White Knights place?" I asked.

"We call them whitecoats, and we were rescuing Angel. What were _you _doing?"

"Me, Hulk, and Morph were rescuing Tech and Splinter. So," I said, "looks like we have something in common."

"Sorry about attacking you back there," Max said. "I thought you were supposed to take Angel somewhere else."

"Nope. Anyway, so, for introductions, this is Tech, Morph, Hulk, and Splinter," I said, pointing to each one.

"Okay, nice to meet all of you," Max said. "And this is Fang, Nudge, Iggy, Gazzy, and the girl you rescued is Angel."

And that began our new journey together. I knew it was gonna be wild.


	4. Chapter 3

**Author's Note: Sorry I told certain people that I would update like a week ago. I got distracted. I'm in math team and I have a tourney to go to Saturday, Oct. 27****th****. I'm saying the date because I am unsure if I'll finish it before tomorrow (Saturday.) Anyway, thanks for being patient with me. And, as you already KNOW, I don't own Maximum Ride. But I DO own Feur, Tech, Morph, Hulk, and Splinter.**

**Chapter Three- "I Don't Trust Them!"**

**MAX P.O.V.**

"I don't trust them," I hissed at Fang later, after the younger children had gotten to know each other.

"Me neither, but the kids really like them," Fang replied, looking eerie in the darkness.

"Who cares what the kids like?!" I almost shouted, but managed to say in a loud whisper. "They are freaks on _our _side! The Erasers didn't show, and the whitecoats didn't do much to stop them."

"God, you're so _paranoid!_ You don't even care how the kids feel! They care about what _you _feel like! But God-forbid you should care about _them _for a change!" Those words burned like acid into my skin.

"Shut the Hell up!" I shouted at him, not caring about silence anymore. I ran at top speed, bursting open my wings and dropping out of the cave in the cliff. I blasted through the air at a sweet two hundred miles per hour at least. If you don't know, my special ability is flying in hyper speed. I was so _mad! _

"What does Fang know? All he has to do is follow orders, while _I _have to dish them out! Does he think I _like _disappointing the kids?" I snarled at no one. My wings burned from the speed I was flying at, but still I drove on. Until, that is, I was grabbed from behind by a powerful hand.

"You are an obsolete creation and you _will_ be terminated," a robotic voice droned as it threw me down into the trees below. _Great, _I thought, seething, _flyboys._

I smashed hard into a redwood, a branch slicing up my left wing badly. As I hit the ground, a net wrapped around me and snapped shut by a metallic device. A flyboy said, "If you try to fight, I have orders to send twenty thousand volts of electricity through this net until you cease the struggle.


	5. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: Thanks to wild MAGIC user and skeletonX for reviewing. And, to answer your comment about chapter "four" (its really only chapter 3, but it marked the prologue as chapter one,) I made it short so that I could update and not keep people waiting forever. Thanks to everyone who made me (or anything to do with me) a favorite, and also who reviewed me besides the two above. Thanks guys. Anyway, I give you… CHAPTER FOUR!**

**Chapter Four- "Where's Max?"**

**Fang POV**

"I always screw up everything," I muttered angrily at myself. I swung my fist as hard as I could at the stone wall. _CRACK! _A large area around my fist caved in, sending a crack as thin as a single hair up the length of the wall. My knuckles were raw and bleeding freely from the wound. I mentally stacked up barriers around my mind, shielding me from the pain as I got a cloth from my pack and wrapped it tightly around my hand.

"Max will be back soon, anyway," I snorted. "She always is. All she does is cool off and come back. And then it starts all over again soon. Icy comments are thrown, then we're fighting again." And small hand tugged on the back of my shirt.

"Where's Max?" Angel's small voice asked.

"Hey," I said. "Didn't hear you coming." Talk about an awkward moment. Unless you don't know, I'm not the social type. "Max… went away for a while. She wanted to fly. But she'll be back soon. Why aren't you asleep?"

"I heard you and Max yelling," she replied. "Don't you know you can't lie to me?"

_Right, _I thought, feeling stupid. _Angel can read minds. _"I just don't want you worrying. That's all."

"What are you guys doing up now?" a powerful voice demanded from behind.

"Talking," I said to the bat guy, Feur. "What are _you _doing up?"

"Not being able to sleep because I'm the leader and I heard noises. Naturally I assumed the worst," Feur shot back. _I hate that guy, _I thought.

Angel's eyes went wide. "Fang just said he—" I clamped my hand over her mouth and thought, _shut up! _She lowered her head gloomily.

"Well," Feur said, "since we're all here, why not wake everyone up and make breakfast?"

"I'm all for it," I said. "GUYS!" I shouted into the cave, my voice reverberating loudly off of the wall. "WAKE UP!" Everyone in the cave instantly jumped up in surprise and expectancy of a fight. I was surprised that Feur had actually trained them so well. As expected, they all wondered where Max was, even the members of Feur's group. And, although I hated to admit it, I was beginning to worry. But, I needed to be the leader, so I shut it down and sealed it away, saying to them, "I'm sure she'll be back any time, you'll see.

**Hope you enjoyed it so far! More coming in a week or so.**


	6. Chapter 5

**Author's Note**

**Guys, you have GOT to start reviewing more! I feel like I'm writing this story for no reason. It's like no one reads it. If five more reviews are posted (not all of them can be by you, peacefulloak ********) then I will begin writing the next chapter. Until then, sorry about the delay. Anyway, that said, ON WITH THE STORY!!!**

**Chapter Five- Horrible Experiments**

**Max POV**

I must have dosed off on the trip to Itex, because, the next thing I knew, I was in a cage. AGAIN! These guys just didn't give up! I couldn't even stand in the cramped cube, barely even able to crouch. A loud, thick metal door was slammed hard, sending it flying open. Ari walked in. _God,_ I thought, _just what I need. _"Hey, hero," ari mocked, coming over to my cage. "How you doing?"

"Hmm," I said, "let me see: I have a killer headache, I'm in a cage that a baby would be long enough to just fit in from head to foot, _and_," I added, "I have a butt-ugly werewolf looking at me like he's smart. So, I'm doing dandy, how 'bout you?" Ari lost his temper, like I'd expected he would. His arm whipped out, slipping through the bars to hit me in the jaw.

"You think you're funny?!" he snarled, a crazed look in his eyes. "You won't be so funny after the horrible experiments you get to encounter during your stay."

"Oh, don't worry," I snapped back, "I don't plan on staying for long."

"You haven't got any say in the matter," he laughed maniacally.

"Oh, but I do," I said, watching him carefully, timing him. Until, suddenly, a horrific splinter of pain drove through my skull into my brain. Lights exploded in my view, causing me to smack my head hard against a bar. Feeling blood trickling down my brow, I screamed out, "WHAT'S HAPPENING TO ME?!"

"Guess you _don't _have a choice, huh?" Ari snarled. "My little puppet." I fell into unconsciousness.

A while later, a burning pain in my left leg caused me to explode awake. Looking down, I realized, feeling horribly embarrassed, that I was naked. Whitecoats all around me leapt away in fear, but I felt too out of it to do anything more than moan. One of the whitecoats, the one that looked to be in charge of it all, came back up to me, scalpel in his hand. "This will hurt a lot. Ari told me to make sure you knew." With that, he placed the blade on my left leg, the icy cold of the blade causing me to writhe. I then realized two things: first, they were going to cut on me while I was still awake, and second, the pain in my left leg that woke me up was them doing just that.

"Please, no," I groaned. The man just smiled and buried the blade into my leg, causing a deafening scream of pain and agony to erupt from my mouth. And, I'm sure, anyone going by the building would hear my screams of torture.

**Feur POV**

"Where is Max really?" I hissed at Fang when the others were asleep. "It's been almost two days, you know she's not coming back on her own." Fang looked me dead in the eye.

"We got in a fight," Fang said. "The last thing I said was she was selfish and uncaring. Then she flew away. I figured she'd be back by now. Something went wrong. It must have." I stared into the sky for a while, thinking. I unfolded my wings and stretched. Finally, I said to Fang, "We have to go scouting for her or signs of where she was. Now."

"With that, I leapt into the air, pounding my wings straight down, gaining altitude quickly. Fang was right behind me. "Which way was she flying?" I asked.

"Follow me," Fang said. He turned in a different direction and headed that way, me right behind. I fired off a burst of echolocation constantly, sifting through the images like pictures.

"Stop," I said suddenly. I fired off a burst of echolocation down, confirming what I'd thought. "A tree down there has been really messed up. A redwood. Follow me," I said, launching down at maximum speed. At the base of the tree, I snapped open my wings and made an extremely suddenly stop. Fang landed beside me. Feathers were scattered throughout the area. Blood had hardened on the tree.

"These are Max's," Fang said, picking up a feather.

"Good," I said. "Now we know where she was last. Now we just need to figure out where she is now."


End file.
